When the President's father had a stroke sometime
later in '62--wasn't it?

Q:

It was in the early winter of '62, I think.

Lasker:

Early winter? Yes, early winter of '61. I
realized that perhaps the President
would realize through his frustration in
trying to help his father how little was
known about the treatment of stroke,
which is due to arteriosclerosis but
because of its location in the arteries
of the brain or on the way to the brain
it's very hard to treat.

I went to see him in July of '62 and urged him
again to appoint a commission on stroke.
He understood the need of it and he
said, “How will we get this done?” And I
said, “Well, let's talk to Mike
Feldman.” Feldman was away and the
matter dragged, and Feldman and
Sorenson, as I believe I have said,
thought that it was a bad idea because
it was something connected with the
President's family. The President had
just appointed a panel on retardation
because his family had a problem in this
area and they thought it was a bad idea
to have something else that represented
a problem that the Kennedy family
suffered from.

Q:

From a political point of view, was that the
idea?

Lasker:

Well, I don't know, public relations--this was
theirnotion.
Actually, strokes are the third cause of
death in the